How does the Bucks Make Bucks?

I teach high school students in a Paris suburb.  Overall, my students are sweet, excitable, and hormonal, like all teenagers.  I enjoy getting to know them and all their quirks. Mainly, I like asking them about what they think of Americans (“obese” is the first thing that comes up in every class), and what they think Americans think of the French.  We read articles about culture clash and first impressions and they giggle when I imitate the stereotypical Frenchman: smoking a cigarette, talking about literature/art/love, and sipping a coffee in a local café. A-ha.  The local café. Recently, I brought in an article on the now year-long Starbucks party in Paris.  It seems every corner I turn, there’s a new one, filled with French people discovering the joy of adding caramel syrup to their lattés.  The article – from early 2004 – discussed the mixed feelings the author had about Starbucks’  impending arrival.  Like most ex-pats living in the city, she understood that so much of Paris’ charm was wrapped up in its café culture.  Starbucks, she argued, was the antithesis of the traditional French café experience which consists of:  waiting twenty minutes for the waiter to come to your tableordering your coffeereceiving your coffee and wondering how one sip can cost two euroswaiting three hours to pay “What do you think?” I asked my students, “Did she sum up the French café correctly?” “Oh yes… The French are very slow. But that’s the whole point!” answered Guillaume, a tall, lanky kid who claims he learned his nearly flawless English from video games, not school, “We want to know everybody in the café, and talk to the shopkeeper, and sit for hours…” “And comment on the fashion of the people!” chipped in Karine, and the entire class giggled. “Starbucks serves coffee to go.  Would you want your coffee to go?” I asked “No!” added Sebastian again, “I want to sit in the café for hours!” “But,” counteracted Jeanette, a hip brunette with lots of make-up, “If I take my coffee to go, I can to look at the store windows and to drink the coffee when I looking…” “I see, so it does have its advantages,” I said, “Starbucks coffee comes in small, medium, and large.  What size do you think you would get?” “A large coffee?  I think I’d be too crazy!” offered Sebastian, as he began to break into fake convulsions. “Well, to be fair, it’s more milk than it is coffee.  Just some espresso, and lots and lots of milk,” I clarified. Two girls stuck out their tongue in disgust. “I want coffee, not milk,” clarified Karine. “What if you could add vanilla to it?  It would be more like a dessert…” I offered. “Ooooo… that could be good.  Vanilla…”  “For the people, this is not healthy.  Too much coffee.  Too much milk.  Syrup.  To eat like this is bad,” chipped in Sebastian, still fake-jittery. “Yeah, then the Starbucks coffee becomes like a drug for the people.  They need coffee to go every morning. And if every morning they take a big coffee with milk and syrup, that’s not good,” added another anti-Starbuckser. “Oh, but it must taste very good,” said another, with a dreamy look in her eyes, “I like vanilla..” “Where is Starbucks in Paris?  I’m going to try next time I go…” said her friend sitting next to her. Obviously, the French have mixed feelings, too.  —————Lee Ann Cornelius writes her own lovely blog at www.odessastreet.net. Please stop by and tell her we sent you.